Self-proclaimed ex-terrorists tell Western Michigan University crowd to 'wake up'

Jonathon Gruenke | Kalamazoo GazetteKamal Saleem speaks to an audience at Miller Auditorium during Monday evening's presentation, "Why We Want to Kill You." Saleem and Walid Shoebat spoke to the audience addressing the causes of terrorism and how to combat it. Both claim to be former Islamic terrorists turned peace activists.

KALAMAZOO -- To illustrate his point, self-described former Islamic terrorist Kamal Saleem lay down on the Miller Auditorium stage before an audience of 1,300 people Tuesday.

America is similarly asleep to the threat of an Islamic fundamentalism bent on destroying Western culture, spreading Islamic Shariah law worldwide and has no qualms about using violence to achieve those goals -- including in the United States, Saleem said.

"America didn't know what to do with 9/11. They hit the snooze button and went right back (to sleep). Today we gotta wake up as a nation," Saleem said.

"A great speaker said, 'My people perish for the lack of knowledge.' Today knowledge is given to you," he told an audience whose members at times applauded and other times vocally disagreed during the more than hourlong presentation Tuesday.

Jonathon Gruenke | Kalamazoo GazetteKamal Saleem, right, speaks to an audience at Miller Auditorium during Monday evening's presentation, "Why We Want to Kill You." Saleem and Walid Shoebat, left, spoke to the audience addressing the causes of terrorism and how to combat it.

The speeches by Saleem and Walid Shoebat, both of whom claim to be former Islamic terrorists who converted to Christianity, were not without controversy.

The title of the presentation, "Why We Want to Kill You," and the posters promoting their appearance drew criticism from faculty and students in recent weeks.

Audience members waited as long as 45 minutes to get in to Miller, passing through metal detectors.

Western Michigan University student Ngeyan Almutairi, a Muslim, said afterward that the speeches were full of hate and misinformation about Islam.

"It's hate speech when he said Muslims are terrorists and want to kill Americans. It's hate speech," Almutairi said.

Saleem and Shoebat have taken their message to college campuses and churches around the country.

On Tuesday, the two told the crowd they were raised in the Middle East to hate Jews and glorify violence against Jews in the name of Islam, suggesting it is a common ideology in the Islamic world.

But the radical point of view is not successfully combated because the West is afraid of offending all Muslims. Instead, it bows to political correctness, they suggested.

"Islamic fundamentalism and the cult of radical Jihad is a cult-like process that indoctrinates masses in unison," Shoebat said.

He said the goal is to "convert the masses to become remorseless killers, seekers of salvation by death, in order to establish an Islamic hegemony."